1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of data processing, and more particularly to systems and methods for providing interpretive information for objects distributed in a facility. The present invention also relates to electronic game devices.
2. Description of the Background Art
Museums, galleries, and other facilities that display objects for viewing and appreciation typically need to present interpretive information to visitors about the displayed objects, whether they are paintings, sculptures, air planes, or animals. Each visitor will typically be interested in different objects, and have their own level of motivation and ability to learn about the objects on display. One type of visitor touring a museum may wish to learn about a specific artist or painting, or more generally about a period in art history, or style of painting. Other visitors prefer to tour the museum at their leisure, viewing some objects, passing over others. For those works they do view, they may wish to learn only general information about the work, but on occasion may desire more detailed information about the artist, and the like.
Other visitors prefer to be guided through the museum on a tour of selected objects, but still have the ability to obtain detailed information for works in which they are interested. Such visitors may want to select a tour of a specific type of art, such as paintings, or sculptures, and may desire a specific length of tour, such as a half-hour or hour.
Finally, there exists an entire class of potential visitors, particularly adolescents, who do not visit museums because of a perceived lack of enjoyment or excitement in traditional museum touring. Any museum that can entice such individuals can increase its patronage, and ultimately its profitability. These visitors are typically more interested in game oriented activities, and thus would prefer a tour that provides information through a game format.
To satisfy the needs of these various types of visitors, a museum needs to make touring a museum and learning about its exhibits easy, enjoyable, and adaptable to the spectrum of different visitors.
Museums and the like have typically provided text based products, such as catalogs, brochures, or fixed placards, that describe the objects on display in order to provide visitors to information about the exhibits and objects. The catalogs are carried by the visitor who must read an entry for each exhibit she views. Because of limitations in the size and amount of text that can be included in the catalog, the information provided may not be sufficiently detailed for any given exhibit, artist or period to satisfy the visitor's needs. The catalog, while adequately discussing a specific work, may not provide a sufficient discussion of the artistic period, or the artist's background. Further, while some visitors may enjoy reading long detailed passages on each work, other visitors may only want a brief analysis and description. Thus, a great many tradeoffs must be made in the catalogs in order to suit the varied needs of the visitors. Fixed placards, placed near each object, also have the same limitations as catalogs, in the amount of text, the level of detail that can be provided, and the ability to entice visitors to read them.
Historical, scientific, and other museums generally have a diverse variety of media, including graphics, videotapes, and other modes of display, to both convey information about exhibits to visitors, and to engage visitors in the touring process. These media generally are fixed to a specific object or group of objects in the facility, and again can only provide a selected amount of information and detail to the visitor. The visitor typically choose whether or not to read or view the entirety of the provided interpretive material based on its perceived length. The visitor generally has little or no way to control the amount of explanatory material they view. Other visitors may not be interested in reading a catalog, placards, or other media at all for any number of reasons, and thereby do not receive any type of interpretive information from the museum.
Accordingly, because of the diversity of visitors and their differing needs for interpretive information, and interest in obtaining the information, it is desirable to provide an interpretive device that allows the visitor to select the type, amount, and level of information they receive about objects in the museum. In order to engage visitors who are disinclined to read any material, or who are otherwise not disposed to visit museums, it is desirable to provide an interpretative device that transforms a museum tour into a challenging, interactive and participatory game.
The types of information media generally provided by museums and the like are predominantly visual, and require the visitor to either read, or at least view, a text or graphic item that is separate from the object of interest. This interpretive process, however, has two significant problems. First, if the visitor is reading or viewing a graphic, they are not viewing the work itself, and thus may have to refer back and forth from the text to the object repeatedly. Second, and more importantly, visual media precludes visitors who are blind or visually impaired from fully appreciating and learning about the works. The Americans with Disabilities Act now requires museums to make their facilities accessible to all persons, including the visually disabled, and thus visual based media is insufficient to fulfill this requirement.
An appreciation of these problems has led to a variety of interpretive devices that provide audio recordings that can be listened to while the visitor tours the facility. For example, a standard cassette player can be equipped with a headset for personal use, and provided with a prerecorded tape. A tour of the facility describing specific objects in a specific order is prerecorded and the museum patron proceeds along a preset path defined by the recorded tour. Since the tour is audio based, there is no need for the visitor to read while viewing the object, and the visitor can listen to the tape and observe the work simultaneously. Further, the audio format is beneficial to those visitors with visual difficulties. However, because of the limitations of recorded tapes, the visitor has no ability, using the tape, to obtain information about objects that are not described on the tape. Further, because of the very limited capacity of audio tape, such tapes typically provide only general information about a work or artist, and the visitor is unable to obtain further detailed information from the device about selected objects or exhibits of particular interest. Providing very extensive detail for all objects results in an intolerably slow tour, and providing too little information fails to satisfy many visitors' needs for interpretive information. Finally, some visitors may find tape tours uninspiring in content or presentation, or confining of the visitor's freedom to roam the museum. Even with these limitations, taped tours have become a predominant form of interpretive device, and are used by many museums throughout the world.
Other forms of audio-based interpretive devices have also been employed. One such device is a handheld unit resembling a straightened telephone receiver, known as a radio wand. The unit receives localized radio broadcasts of commentary about specific objects in the museum. Wires placed in the floor and area around a specific object act as an antenna that transmits the recorded commentary into a zone around the object. When the visitor enters the zone, the unit receives and amplifies the recorded commentary. Patrons can walk freely through the museum and listen to narratives for exhibits in whatever order they want. However, since a radio signal is broadcast information it typically can not be individually disseminated for several different exhibits which are close to one another, such as in an art museum. Because of the prerecorded format, there remains the limitations on the amount and detail of information that can be provided. Further, the visitor has no way to control to amount of information delivered for a specific object, other than choosing whether or not to listen to the entire commentary for an object. Also, because the commentary is radio broadcast the sound quality is generally of limited fidelity. While attempts are typically made to hide the wires under the carpet or in the ceiling or lay them directly on the floor, museums are adverse to this because it is logistically difficult to place the many wires needed and, in many cases, unsightly.
Other interpretive devices are derivative of the above described radio wand, and include the random access based devices. These devices store information about exhibits; the information is accessed through a numeric keypad by entering corresponding index numbers located on the artwork. These devices are limited in that the visitor has access to general information and must follow a voice-mail-like system that presents them with other information retrieval options. At the end of listening to the general information relating to an object, for example, the visitor would have to listen for the audible cues directing them to push one of a selection of index numbers. The indexes direct them to hear information broken down into specific categories, such as biography. The visitor must typically carry a chart that illustrates the branches of information available in the device, and how to access particular items. In practice, these systems have limited capability for branching to one or two categories of information due to the unwieldy nature of menu system or the index entry system. Also, because these wands are radio based, they are not capable of displaying text messages for the hearing impaired. Nor are they programmable by the visitor in order to customize the information retrieved. The devices are not automatically activated by the presence of the wand near a given object, but rather rely on the user to accurately enter index numbers or menu options into the device.
Another form of interpretive device is the recent use of portable CD-ROM (Compact Disk, Read Only Memory) based players to display text and graphic data. The use of CD-ROM format makes it possible to provide a large amount of information to the visitor, thereby surmounting the capacity limitations of audio based products, while also offering the ability to randomly access information, overcoming the linear access requirements of audio products. However, the random access capabilities of a CD-ROM product require an interface that enables the visitor to quickly locate, select, and retrieve the desired information. Conventional CD-ROM based devices have rudimentary menu driven interfaces that require the visitor to make keyboard entries to navigate the menu structure, such as entering an identification number or letter associated with each exhibit in order to retrieve the information related to that exhibit. This keyboard entry system can be difficult for some visitors, and distracting for most, since they must carry a map or other guide that contains the identification numbers, or locate them at each exhibit, and then correctly enter them on the typically very small keyboards. The audio output for this device is delivered through an FM transmitter for in-car usage. The power source is also taken from the car as the device requires substantial electrical power. Current battery technology does not offer enough life to make the unit an effective portable touring device.
Another CD-ROM device, called the Gallery Guide.TM. from Antenna Audio Tours, has a very small screen capable only of handling up to 33 characters scrolled across that screen in a linear fashion. This type of display is not adequate for complex menu selections and therefore this device also uses audible cues similar to the phone-mail-type menu system described above. The portable CD-ROM then acts as a random access memory device similar to the random access radio wand, but it is more difficult to update information, since a new CD-ROM must be mastered for each update of the museums exhibits. In addition, the Gallery Guide provides only a fixed set of tours that are preprogrammed by the museum, and not modifiable by the visitor, or adaptable to the preferences of the visitor.
In addition, CD-ROM players are fragile, and typically not designed for the high volume of use necessitated in the touring environment. For successful use, any portable electronic interpretive device needs to be battery powered, but the mechanical nature of CD-ROM players reduces the effective battery life of such devices.
There are various other design features that are not yet found in existing interpretative devices. Museums are often visited by groups of associated individuals, such as a school or class, or a tour group. Current interpretive device offer no means for providing interconnectivity between group members and adaptable presentation of information to the group members.
Museums generally have both permanent and changing exhibits, the latter designed to bring back patrons for repeated visits. However, current interpretive devices do not allow the museum to develop and store a profile of each user, such that the museum can determine which types of exhibits are of interest to a given visitor, and thereby provide customized information to repeat visitors informing them of new exhibits that they have not seen, or other information of interest, based on the visitors profile. Finally, existing devices do not assist the museum in managing traffic flow through the museum, and reducing congestion in selected areas.
Accordingly, it is desirable therefore to provide an interactive interpretive device that affords the benefits of the audio format, including its non-distractive character, and its usability by the visually impaired, without the limitations on the amount and detail of information that can be provided to the visitor.
In addition, it is desirable to provide an interpretive device allowing for random access of information similar to a CD-ROM player without the physical limitations of CD-ROM players, including mechanical complexity, the need for keyboard based entry, and the lack of audio output capabilities in most operating environments.
Furthermore, it is also desirable to provide any easy to use interface for allowing the visitor to program and customize the retrieval of information to suit their needs. It is desirable to make such a device interactive where a visitor could manipulate the retrieval characteristics of the device, customize its performance, as well as have the unit logically identify the visitor's needs, thus creating a more effective learning and interpretive tool. The random access nature of the device and the interactive design should provide for any variety of user constructed tours, and further allow for challenging, game like tours that stimulate and entice the visitor to locate exhibits to answer questions, or otherwise respond to the device, instead of merely passively using it.
It is also desirable to provide an interface that allow rapid selection of information based on category, and also allows a hearing impaired visitor to access detailed information.
Another problem facing museums and similar facilities is the regulation of visitor traffic throughout the museum. Typically there will be several places in a museum that create bottlenecks, either due to physical limitations on the size of various areas, such as small exhibit halls, or poorly planned connecting passages, or due to visitor interest in new or exciting exhibits. Currently, traffic managment is done statically by constructing the museum to cause traffic to flow in particular patterns, by carefully arranging exhibits, and by other static devices which do not adapt to current traffic levels, nor account for historical variations in traffic patterns. Accordingly, it is desirable to provide a system that allows a museum to track the number and location of its visitors in real time, and to control their movement through the museum.
Currently, museums have a little or no ability to track the specific exhibits that each visitor sees, in order to know what exhibits or object are of interest to each visitor, and to use that information to develop further exhibits, or update the visitor on a later visit as to new exhibits that the visitor may find interesting. Accordingly, a desirable interpretive device should allow the development of visitor profiles.
Finally, an interpretive device should provide for group interconnectivity, allowing members of a group of visitors using the interpretive device to send information to each other, and providing for a group leader, such as a tour guide, with the ability to provide the same information to all group members.